Under the power exchange outlet of the trillion track, standardization and sharing have become the development trend of power batteries
Text | Chen Yao
The era of energy freedom for electric vehicles is accelerating.
Following the official entry into the power exchange field in January, on April 18, the CATL EVOGO power exchange service was officially launched in Xiamen Island, and the first batch of 4 express stations that started the service were distributed in Xiamen Siming District, Huli District and Haicang District, and it is expected that by the end of this year, 30 express transfer stations will be completed on Xiamen Island, that is, there will be 1 change station within every 3 kilometers of service radius.
EVOGO Xiamen Kaesong
EVOGO substation has the characteristics of small footprint, fast circulation, large capacity and full climate. Each standard station covers an area of about 3 parking spaces, the station can store 48 power exchange blocks, it takes only about 1 minute to complete the power exchange of a single power block, and there are different versions of the power station can adapt to the climatic environment of different regions.
According to the plan, THE CATL power exchange brand EVOGO will launch services in the first batch of 10 cities. Nowadays, Xiamen has fired the first shot of power exchange, and in the future, under the comprehensive cooperation of technology, resources and services, the power exchange model will be rolled out nationwide.
With the help of the Ningde era, power batteries are developing towards the trend of standardization and sharing. After the separation of vehicle and electricity, the battery is no longer simply a component of the new energy vehicle, but an asset juxtaposed with the whole vehicle, and its full life cycle value will create a new trillion market.
The power exchange system revitalizes the whole life cycle of the battery
EVOGO substation
The significance of the development of the power exchange mode is beyond doubt, it fundamentally solves the current industrial pain points of slow charging and difficult charging of new energy vehicles, and with the rapid increase in the number of new energy vehicles, the number of charging piles will become more and more difficult to meet consumer demand.
The author sorted out the ownership of public charging piles and new energy vehicles and found that in addition to the temporary increase in the pile-to-car ratio in 2020 (mainly due to the impact of the epidemic, the new energy market was blocked, and the charging pile was listed as a new infrastructure after the outbreak of growth), in the past 6 years, the pile-to-vehicle ratio value has been in a downward trend, and each new energy vehicle can only be allocated to 0.1 public charging piles on average.
Source: China Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance
This means that the construction of public charging piles is far from keeping up with the pace of development of new energy vehicles. On the other hand, the number of charging piles with vehicles is also unsatisfactory, and the data of the China Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure Promotion Alliance shows that the number of charging piles with vehicles in 2021 is only 597,000 units, accounting for 17% of new energy vehicle sales. Obviously, only by charging will not be able to meet the future demand for new energy vehicles, from the perspective of energy efficiency alone, the implementation of the power exchange mode is imperative.
What's more, the significance of the power exchange mode for new energy vehicles is far more than solving mileage anxiety. The power exchange system of electric vehicles is to centralize storage, centralized charging, unified distribution of a large number of batteries through centralized charging stations, and battery replacement services for electric vehicles in the distribution station, which includes power battery assembly, charging and replacing, maintenance, monitoring, and the most difficult to solve the problem of power battery recycling.
In short, the power exchange system is the key link between the production end of the power battery and the recycling end.
The battery charging and maintenance link is entrusted to the replacement power station, which also means that the power battery will often be monitored, cared for and managed by professionals, which is conducive to extending the battery life, and also provides a guarantee for the most dangerous charging period of the current electric vehicle (most of the current battery spontaneous combustion accidents come from the charging period).
In addition, the power exchange is not only good for the battery itself, it also greatly reduces the cost of car purchase for consumers. On the one hand, the popularization of the power exchange mode is conducive to the development of the echelon utilization of power batteries and reduces the cost of the whole life cycle of the battery; on the other hand, the separation of vehicle and electricity can provide a richer business model, such as buying and renting a battery, thereby reducing the threshold for car purchase. From the perspective of the owner, the power exchange mode means that new energy vehicles will be safer, more convenient and more valuable.
Trillions of dollars in battery assetization
EVOGO change station
With the announcement of the launch of the power exchange service brand EVOGO in January 2022, the power exchange model began to be recognized and accepted by more and more industry insiders.
During this year's two sessions, Geely Automobile (00175. HK) Chairman Li Shufu suggested that we should accelerate the standardization and generalization of the power exchange model, further improve the relevant policies and regulations of the power exchange model, optimize the announcement regulations of the power exchange model, establish an exclusive announcement certification system for the power exchange model, and form a separate certification of the car and the battery under the separation of vehicle electricity.
A person from Aodong New Energy told the author, "After the Ningde era entered the power exchange track, the width of the track was broadened, and our business progress was more smooth, and many partners such as FAW and GAC took the initiative to discuss the development of the power exchange model." ”
The power exchange mode outlet has come, and the biggest feature of the power exchange system is the battery assetization, that is, the battery is no longer just a part of the supply chain of new energy vehicles, but has become an asset that is juxtaposed with the new energy vehicle, which is the so-called separation of vehicle electricity.
Compared with the current form of battery ownership after battery installment payment, consumers in the car-electricity separation mode have no ownership of the battery, and only need to pay a monthly service fee, which not only greatly reduces the purchase cost of the first-time owner, but also provides more battery models for selection in the future.
Li Bin, founder of Nio Automobile (NYSE: NIO), has publicly said that battery assetization is the most profitable business in the new energy automobile industry, "even if a user spends 10,000 yuan a year to rent batteries, assuming that more than 200 million vehicles in China are electric vehicles, the business of photovoltaic battery rental is 2 trillion yuan, only this business is a really big business." ”
CICC estimates in the relevant research report that the number of substations by 2025 will be about 12,500 to 51,900. In the long run, the country needs 550,000 passenger car replacement power stations and 60,000 heavy truck replacement power stations, corresponding to a total of 1.8 trillion yuan of substation equipment and grid-side equipment.
At present, the industrial chain of operating the whole life cycle of batteries is still relatively blank, but its significance and market scale are obvious. In the latest subsidy policy, it is also clear that pure electric vehicles priced at more than 300,000 yuan are not subsidized, except for models with power exchange mode, which shows the important value of battery assetization.
The chocolate power exchange block breaks the barrier of power battery standardization
Go with EVOGO
As early as 2011, Liu Zhenya, then general manager of the State Grid, declared that the State Grid determined the basic commercial operation mode of electric vehicles as: power exchange as the mainstay, plug-in and charging as a supplement, centralized charging, and unified distribution. Building a charging and replacing station near a substation avoids impacting the distribution grid. The city center can rely on substations in the suburbs to build centralized battery charging stations.
However, the original "peak shaving and valley filling" not only failed to usher in a full response from the industry, most vehicle companies have expressed their resistance to the power exchange model. The fundamental reason is that no one will think that the power battery can be standardized in the short term, and without the standardized power battery, it is impossible to talk about replacing the power.
Ten years later, the entry of the Ningde era is expected to break the deadlock that battery standards are difficult to unify.
An indisputable fact is that at present, no company in the world has a stronger influence on power batteries than in the Ningde era. According to data from the China Automotive Power Battery Industry Innovation Alliance, in 2021, China's power battery installed vehicles accumulated 154.5GWh, an increase of 142.8% year-on-year. Among them, the installed capacity of The Ningde era is 80.51GWh, and the market share is 52.1%.
From the overall installed capacity, the Ningde era occupies half of the country, but from the perspective of brand coverage, except for a few self-sufficient new energy vehicle companies such as BYD, the brand coverage rate of the ningde era battery is almost 100%. Under their own conditions, no car company will reject the Ningde era.
In fact, the power exchange system launched by EVOGO in the Ningde era is suitable for the models produced by most car companies. Its core product, chocolate power exchange block, can adapt to 80% of the new models that have been listed and will be launched in the next 3 years, with models spanning from A00 to B and C class passenger cars and logistics vehicles. The substation is suitable for various brands using the aforementioned electric blocks. At the same time, the existing power block supports the existing home charging and fast charging and replenishment methods.
According to the planning of the Ningde era, at the end of this year, 30 express stations will be completed in Xiamen, which means that there will be 1 express station per 3 kilometers of service radius on Xiamen Island. At present, the minimum monthly rent price of chocolate exchange block is 399 yuan / block, and the rental price will be dynamically adjusted according to the different use conditions of users. The service price of the change station is comparable to that of the fast charge, and will be dynamically adjusted according to the station site, time period and other factors.
In the future, CATL will work with more partners to launch small green ring models and build a small green ring city. At that time, the barriers that are difficult to unify the power battery standards between car companies will also be loosened due to the large-scale application of chocolate exchange blocks.
The residual value of the power battery is sublimated, and the battery bank is promising
Night view of the change station
With the entry of the Ningde era, the pain point of battery standardization has been opened a gap, and the barrier to the future power exchange system will lie in whether there is a battery bank that is trusted by consumers to manage batteries.
After the separation of vehicle and electricity, consumers will no longer have the ownership of the power battery, but will rent and buy, so that the power battery becomes the porter of energy, and the real ownership of the battery is the battery bank. Power battery assembly, charging and replacing, maintenance, monitoring, and the most difficult to solve the problem of power battery recycling, will be the responsibility of the battery bank.
Previously, BYD (002594. SZ) chairman Wang Chuanfu has repeatedly opposed the power exchange model, the biggest reason is that the replacement power station does not have a reasonable business logic, and the industry that cannot be profitable will not be done by BYD. However, BYD's "unprofitable" view is based on the era of the power exchange model, when the power exchange link is indeed difficult to make a profit, but once a large-scale power exchange system is formed, the battery bank that operates the whole life cycle of the battery will have great potential in commercialization.
Putting aside the cost of replacing electricity, from the perspective of renting and buying batteries alone, only one rent can form a trillion-level market, not to mention the power battery ladder and recycling, and its income is also very considerable.
As mentioned above, the power battery under the power exchange system is a long-life, easy to disassemble, easy to detect battery, and real-time monitoring of the battery performance indicators during its use to judge the health status of the battery, which means that the dream of battery ladder utilization has been illuminated into reality, and the decommissioned power battery can be reused in many fields such as low-speed vehicles, electric bicycles, energy storage and so on.
Finally, even if its residual value is exhausted, it is a great benefit to recover precious metals through dismantling. For example, relying on its subsidiary Guangdong Bangpu, NINGDE Times has created an ecological closed loop of "battery production and use cascade utilization and recycling of resources", and the total recovery rate of its core metals has reached 99.3%.
It is foreseeable that there is an industry leader that penetrates into the whole life cycle of the power battery as the driving force behind it, and the once difficult power exchange will undoubtedly become feasible, and the power station replacement will also serve as an important hub in the future energy Internet, helping China achieve the great goal of "carbon peaking and carbon neutrality".